Corporator's Son Not Accused In Mass Copying Scam

A Hyderabad corporator, Diddi Rambabu, has clarified that his son Dr. D. Krishna is not one of the accused in the medical entrance paper-leak racket that was busted recently, and was only a witness.

According to Rambabu, the CBI, who had caught Krishna in Chandigarh, had done so erroneously, and Krishna was released after having his statement recorded. According to the medical student, Gurivi Reddy, the kingpin of the scam, had offered to help him out in the exam for Rs. 20 lakhs. Krishna, however, had refused.

According to Rambabu, Gurivi knew Krishna as the former was the latter's senior in college, adding that Gurivi had tried over and over again to tempt Krishna into paying the money for the answers.

It may be mentioned that Gurivi Reddy and main co-conspirator Gangadhar Reddy were caught on 11 November in relation to a mass-copying hustle that was spread from Hyderabad to patna to Chandigarh.

According to sources, the two men used decoys to go and sit in the exam halls with miniature earphones so tiny, that some of them could only be removed surgically. The police speculate that payments of Rs. 30 - Rs. 40 lakhs have been made to Gurivi Reddy by some individuals for the sake of the leaked papers and their answers.

They suspect that the beneficiaries might have been Gangadhar Reddy's roommates from his time as a student of Gandhi Medical College.

Of the 16 people arrested with regard to the case, Tollywood producer Kota Gangadhar Reddy is from Hyderabad; kingpin P. Gurivi Reddy, N. Jagdish, Aminul, Rehumunisha, and Mahendra from Kadapa; P. Bharat Chand and Suchi Mamatha hail from Tirupati; P. Siddhartha is of Kurnool; G. Padma, P. Manjula, G. Krishnaveni, and Shaikh Afroz are from Nellore; and G. Sivageetha, V. Devika, and Thameem Khan are of Chittoor.

The police in Chittoor district say that the girls from there lied to their families and flew down to Chandigarh for the money offered by Gurivi Reddy. Saying that Tirupati, which is in Chittoor, was the largest educational institution in all of Rayalaseema, the police lamented the lack of values inculcated by teachers and parents that would drive the girls to do something like this.